National Sign Language R&D Centre soon at IGNOU

17 August, 2011

The activities for the establishment of the Indian Sign Language Research and Training Centre (ISLRTC) at the Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU) are taking a concrete shape with the Vice Chancellor of the university, Prof. V.N. Rajasekharan Pillai, announcing major developments in this regard.

“The deaf adults should be able to go to the highest level for which we will be conducting activities in different parts of the country. IGNOU will host seminars and workshops for the empowerment of the deaf people. It for this purpose that we will be conducting meetings once in three months with the National Association of the Deaf (NAD) and All India Federation of Deaf (AIFD),” he announced during first such meeting with the representatives from these organisations.

Shivaji Panda, Vice President of AIFD, Dr. Omkar Singh, Secretary of AIFD, Mr. Anuj Jain, Joint Secretary of NAD and among others representing the deaf association proposed that for the establishment of the ISLRTC, preference should be given to the deaf candidates for the appointment of the staff to which the VC agreed and said that, “We shall appoint deaf staff on probationary basis for the proposed center.”

The agenda of the meeting was to seek the advice and views of the representatives of the deaf associations in shaping ISLRTC which has been fully funded by the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment for a period of five years. IGNOU would host seminars to enable AFD and NAD to have their annual meetings in order to share their views with the university.

“Such meetings will be held regularly involving the associations, federations along with the professionals promoting the Indian Sign language and deaf education. Focus will be on research and deaf education across the countries. Rehabilitation Council of India (RCI) is also now fairly in agreement with the university,” said Prof. P.R. Ramanujam, Pro-VC.